If only a glimmering pond to view
   a shimmer to ease my fear
of being cursed to look
   in an unreflecting mirror.

My sight is sufficient
   as I can see the first break of day
before the **** calls his warning
   or the horned owl beds away.

My touch is sensitive enough
  but I know not what I feel,
the pain of ancient splinters numbs
  when I touch the spinning wheel.

No, my sight is not the cause
  of my inability to hear
the sounds that I must make,
  it is the unreflecting mirror.

Perhaps outside they watch with me
  as I shyly shed a tear,
I cannot see our faces, though
  in the unreflecting mirror.

If only a glimmering pond to view
   a shimmer to ease my fear
of being cursed to look
   in an unreflecting mirror.

My vision is sufficient
   as I can see the first break of day
before the **** calls his warning
   or the horned owl beds away.

No, my sight is not the cause
  of my inability to hear
the sounds that I must make,
  it is the unreflecting mirror.

My touch is sensitive enough
  but I know not what I feel,
the pain of ancient splinters numbs
  when I touch the spinning wheel.

Perhaps outside they watch with me
  as I shyly shed a tear,
I cannot see our faces, though
  in the unreflecting mirror.

If only a glimmering pond to view
   a shimmer to ease my fear
of being cursed to look
   in an unreflecting mirror.

My sight is sufficient
   as I can see the first break of day
before the **** calls his warning
   or the horned owl beds away.

My touch is sensitive enough
  but I know not what I feel,
the pain of ancient splinters numbs
  when I touch the spinning wheel.

No, my sight is not the cause
  of my inability to hear
the sounds that I must make,
  it is the unreflecting mirror.

Perhaps outside they watch with me
  as I shyly shed a tear,
I cannot see our faces, though
  in the unreflecting mirror.

I know that my profile will be serene
in the nroth of an unreflecting sky.
Mercury of vigil, chaste mirror
to break the pulse of my style.

For if ivy and the cool of linen
are the norm of the body I leave behind,
my profile in the sand will be the old
unblushing silence of a crocodile.

And though my tongue of frozen doves
will never taste of flame,
only of empty broom.

I'll be a free sign of oppressed norms
on the neck of the stiff branch
and in teh ache of dahlias without end.

When I have fears that I may cease to be
    Before my pen has glean'd my teeming brain,
Before high-piled books, in charactery,
    Hold like rich garners the full ripen'd grain;
When I behold, upon the night's starr'd face,
    Huge cloudy symbols of a high romance,
And think that I may never live to trace
    Their shadows, with the magic hand of chance;
And when I feel, fair creature of an hour,
    That I shall never look upon thee more,
Never have relish in the faery power
    Of unreflecting love;--then on the shore
Of the wide world I stand alone, and think
Till love and fame to nothingness do sink.

Awkward - as the infinite
Black of night against
A background of baby bonnet pink.
No sustaining verse issues from
An unreflecting pool
Stagnant from deprivation of
Refreshing waters of life.
Cold intellect attempting
To compose poetry alive with
Crisp sunrises, rolling streams,
The perfume of a bashful girl -
Cold intellect, anxious and sad,
Desperately trying to
Regain a solid footing on earth,
Make its stand in a world
Of daisies and mockingbirds
Before it's too late.




- fr

i saved the unmarked bottle for the day after
when i came back to the destruction left by the hurricane of your wrath.
i could hear the clinking of glass shards you'd swept away and the whisper of a pale shadow where our picture hung the night before.

the house was empty.
i sat in the vacuum of our bedroom turning twenty stones in my hand.

one by one they fell into me like i was the bottom of a lake and they were finding home again.
we sank together in solitude,
the ebb and flow of water churning sleep songs and darkness.

at the bottom i saw colorless fish,
their bodies slack and immobile.
scales unreflecting,
like peachflesh forgotten under the sun.
only skin and seasickness.

i saw myself awake, wide eyed, entangled
in wet sleeping clothes,
fingers reaching and withdrawing,
mouth opening and closing, resigned to drown

and i saw you:
a mirage
a blurry refraction
vibrating and dreamlike
you scooped me to shore, laughing all the while.
your hand reached into my stomach
and skipped the stones into the horizon ahead.

you jumped in
unreflecting

just like that
without a flick

baby all the animals go to heaven
if you love them
even snakes

you ask why there must be the war
always

please don't take the suffering
think of dolphins, please

you rescue me every time
for free
you let me sleep in your love

i could give you myself
if i owned me